Know several of you have been waiting on this post, so here's what I've got to share:

Last week, we started a phased rollout of the Microsoft Copy and Paste update in EMEA and India.

On March 29, we began a phased rollout of the Copy and Paste update to T-Mobile customers in the United States.

There will be a Dell update that will provide additional enhancements/ fixes coming after this Copy and Paste Microsoft update. I don't have an ETA for the Dell update just yet.

While the Copy and Paste update rollout started yesterday, it will happen in a phased rollout over the next few weeks.

To be clear, there are technically 3 updates that apply to Dell Venue Pro customers. The February update and the Cut and Paste update are coming from Microsoft. The Cut and Paste update requires you to have the February update installed on your phone. The third update is the Dell one I mentioned. I'll blog about that one later. According to an update to Eric's post I mentioned earlier, here's how he explains it:

Some of you might actually get two update notices on your phone in the weeks ahead (if you see "Delivering update" in both status columns). The first notification you'll get is for the February update. After you've installed it, you'll receive a second notification for the "copy and paste" update. I've already started seeing a few questions about the timing of these in blogs and forums. Because of how our process works, these two updates most likely won't arrive back to back, but days or even a week or two apart. You can learn more from this support article.

Like Eric mentioned in his post, Microsoft is delivering the Copy and Paste update in batches. That's why it's not getting to all of you at once. Regarding the subsequent Dell update I mentioned above, I don't have details or timing to share on the Dell update at this time, but I will blog about it on Direct2Dell when that changes.

So what can you expect from the Microsoft March update? As most of you know, Copy and Paste is one; faster app speed and gaming load times is another. Tweaks to the Marketplace, Outlook, and more. Take a look at this list from Microsoft (under the March 2011 section to get a better idea of what I'm talking about).

The update process requires Microsoft's Zune software. One note: I had already installed the February update on my Venue Pro. In other words, I went from Microsoft update #1 to Microsoft update #2. I was able to go through this process last night, so let me take you through the steps to install the Copy and Paste update:

Connect your Venue Pro to a machine that has the latest Zune software installed. If you want to manually check for the update, launch the Zune software, click the Phone link, then choose the View Synch Options button, and click Update on the left hand side.

I didn’t need to manually check. When I plugged in my phone to my XPS 7100, here’s what I saw:

Then, when I clicked update, it notified me that I needed to update my Zune software first:

Next, I started the Phone Update process:

The whole process took about 20 – 25 minutes for me overall. The longest part was creating the backup:

Then, I got the confirmation that the update was successful:

After the update, my Venue Pro shows the OS version as 7.0.7390.0 (in the About section under Settings):

After installing the update, I tried a few apps. Seemed faster overall…. Netflix load and movie playback times were quicker. Apps I use a lot like Twitter and Facebook seemed snappier. Some other folks have said positive things about the speed improvements on game load times. I don't have any games on my Venue Pro. Any recommendations on good ones?

I know there are some other issues that many of you are asking me to address. Like I mentioned, I’ll blog more about the upcoming Dell update in the future.

Thanks for your patience. If you have any questions about this process or Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 update, drop me a comment below.

Thanks for the update, and looking forward to the Dell update to see if it fixes some freeze/crashes I've been having, seemingly related to wifi initiation.

As for games, Full House Poker just came out and is mildly addicting.

I was thinking for some reason that NoDo might come with more ring tone options, as I just set up a colleague with his HTC Arrive (comes stock with NoDo) and that phone has tons of non-awful ring tones.

I don't suppose this is on the list of things to rectify with the Dell update? Just an 'old school ringer' and I'd be happy....basically ANYTHING other than the current options.

Well well well, Lionell... Now I know why the DVP is delayed in European markets by months and months and more motnhs. The reason is a series of inexusable failures, ranging from hardware defects and software faults (on retail units, mind you!) to mundane issues like non-conforming CE marks or wrong configuration labels. Is Dell not ashamed of itself? As a prospective DVP buyer, I feel like an absolute fool. First, you make me wait for the device for half a year, and then I will probably have to pay a premium price. And for German-speaking markets, it does not even have a QWERTZ keyboard. You have no idea of the misery you have brought into the smartphone market. No wonder that everybody is an Apple fanboy.

I just purchased this phone (4/8) and am quite close to returning the thing in lieu of all the problems I've had. Scouring various forums I see that I am not the only one. Wondering if this was resolved with a newer physical phone build than the phone I received (mine was 1/27) but still wondering if the new firmware will address all of the little freezing, wifi, and other related issues? Also how close are we to this release considering I only have so many days with Dell to return the handset if I am not satisfied?

So here it is April 18th and still no firmware update. Any ETA yet? Were will it be posted or how will it be delivered? Is it going to be a downloaded file from the dell support site? Is there any way to recieve notification once it becomes available. Sheesh!

Lionel, any new on the firmware upgrade will be helpful. My DVP is still locking up5-7 times a day. great looking phone but embarrassing that it locks up at the most inconvenient times. My next phone WILL NOT have a slde out keyboard. I NEVER use it. the Microsoft virtual keyboard is excellent, amazingly excellent actually.